1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a charging device for an electric vehicle, which charges a storage device that supplies electric power to an electric motor for driving a vehicle.
2. Description of the Related Art
Electric vehicles include vehicles that use an electric motor alone as a drive source and hybrid vehicles that uses an electric motor and an engine as drive sources. Both types of electric vehicle include a battery serving as a storage device for supplying electric power to the electric motor, and when the remaining capacity of the battery decreases, the battery must be charged externally. Further, in a hybrid vehicle that uses both an electric motor and an engine as drive sources, the battery is usually charged by driving the engine, but occasionally the battery is charged by supplying electric power from an external power source, without driving the engine. When the battery is charged externally in this manner in an electric vehicle having an electric motor, including a hybrid vehicle, an on-board charger that raises the voltage of a household commercial power source and converts this voltage into direct-current power is installed in the electric vehicle so that the storage device can be charged using a commercial power source.
However, several hours are required to charge the storage device to a high voltage of up to approximately DC 400V, for example, by connecting a power source plug, or in other words an outlet, of an AC 100V or AC 200V household commercial power source to the vehicle body, and since this amount of time is excessive, an electric vehicle suffers greatly in terms of user-friendliness in comparison with a gasoline vehicle having a fuel tank that can be filled in a short period of time at a gas station.
Therefore, in recent years progress has been made in the development of a high-speed charger, or in other words a fast charger, that can fully charge a storage device for an electric vehicle in a short time period of approximately several tens of minutes using specialist facilities. Considering the prevalence of high-speed chargers and the user-friendliness of electric vehicles, however, it is preferable in reality to ensure that charging can also be performed from a household commercial power source. Note that Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication H11-178234 describes an electric vehicle in which a non-board battery is charged from a household power source.
To enable charging using both a high-speed charger and a commercial power source, a vehicle body is provided with a high-speed charging connector to which a power supply plug of a high-speed charger is connected so that the on-board battery can be charged using the high-speed charger, and a normal charging connector to which a power source plug is connected so that the on-board battery can be charged using a household commercial power source. However, different charging modes are used during high-speed charging and normal charging, and the method of charging the on-board battery differs between the two modes. Therefore, charging using both methods at the same time, which occurs when both the power supply plug and the power source plug are connected to the vehicle body, is preferably avoided.
Nevertheless, when both the high-speed charging connector and the normal charging connector are provided on the vehicle body, a user may mistakenly connect the power supply plug of the high-speed charger and the normal charging power source plug at the same time.